After a protracted legal battle over a secret land grab by officials with the City of SeaTac, Gerry and Kathy Kingen, owners of Salty's Seafood Grills have won, and a payment of $4.25 million was authorized by the City on Oct. 10. That payment represents the City's portion of the settlement.The remainder of the $13 million settlement will covered by insurance.
After a seven-week trial, finally in January of 2016 the jury determined that SeaTac violated the Kingen owned K&S Development's, LLC's property rights when it blocked K&S's attempts to build a park n' fly garage at the 154th Street Station Area off Highway 518.
The decision is a major victory for the couple who, more than ten years ago, were judged to be the victims in a complex series of events orchestrated by the city to cheat them out of the value of land they owned near the airport. The Kingen lawsuit actually awarded them more than $18 million in damages, attorney fees and accumulated interest (which continued as the City contested the decision to $22 million). A video of the SeaTac City Council meeting about the settlement is on the City's website with the salient discussion starting at 1:22:15.
SeaTac Mayor Michael J. Siefkes led the discussion.
That trial had the judge excoriate the city for what he called its egregious actions but the city appealed the jury verdict and trial court’s ruling to the state Court of Appeals. Both parties then entered into mediation with SeaTac's insurance carriers.
The legal woes for the city even involved the city’s two insurance carriers — who also filed a lawsuit against the city arguing they were not on the hook due to the city’s illegal conduct. That argument failed and each will pay close to $4.3 million.
The city will tap its general fund to pay their portion.
To put some extra heat on the city, the Kingen's had filed two additional lawsuits against the city those, and a lawsuit from the insurance companies will all be dismissed as a result of the settlement.
An agreement was reached between the parties to not publicly discuss the settlement for the next six months. A codicil of the agreement provided that they could not initiate any conversations about the matter unless prompted by someone else.
A joint news release is expected to be issued, stating only that the case has been settled, once all papers are signed.
